Magnetic corner guard

ABSTRACT

A magnetic corner guard comprises a housing having an end portion and a skirt portion with a magnet attached to at least one of the portions.

United Stat-esP-atent 1.1 1

Walker [1 1 3,864,653 [451 Feb; 4, 1975 MAGNETIC CORN-ER GUARD 21' Appl. No.: 457,089 I [52] us. Cl. 335/285,. 335 /302- a [51] Int. Cl. 1101: 7/20 [58 Field oi'Search 335/285,302,303,306

[56] References Cited V UNITED STATES PATENTS 3,110,516 11/1963 Sukala ..335/303X 3,480,894 11/1969 Joyce ..335/303 Primary Examiner--G. Harris Attorney, Agent, or Firm-Oldham & Oldham Co.

[57] 1 ABSTRACT A magnetic corner guard comprises a housing having an end portion and a skirt portion with a magnet attached to at least one of the portions.

8 Claims, 4 Drawing Figures 1. MAGNETIC CORNER GUARD BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION The present invention relates to a magnetic corner guard. More specifically, the present invention relates to a magnetic corner guard for covering sharp corners of metallic articles which tend to tear tarpaulins, covers and the like.

Heretofore in the field of covering articles as during transportation to protect them from rain, snow, dust and the like, covers have generally been used to protect the articles with the covers commonly being secured by rope to the bed of a truck or a railroad car. Problems frequently arose due to the fact that the articles which were often made of metal had sharp corners, projections, or the like so that relative movement of the cover with respect to the article during transportation would cause the protrusion to abraid and often wear through the cover. This, of course, necessitated repair where possible and often would render the cover useless. In order to overcome this problem, such protrusions were often covered with various items such as cardboard taped to thearticle or the application of wooden members built around or over the protrusion. Even in these situations, problems were often encountered since the cardboard would wear and thereby expose the protrusion or else become unfastened. The use of wooden members required time consuming and costly efforts to build a suitable housing which itself lacked any protruding members. Moreover, in many situations it was often difficult to apply cover guards. Additionally, the aplication of such guards was time consuming, often required custom tailoring and often could not be. reused.

SU MMARY OF THE. INVENTION It is, therefore, an object of the present invention to provide a magnetic corner guard which prevents protrusions of a covered metallic article from abraiding and tearingfthe cover.

It is another object of the present invention'to provide a magnetic corner guard, asabove, which is inexpensive to produce and has simplicity of structure.

It is a further object of the present invention to'provide a magnetic corner guard, as above, which is readily and easily applied to the metalarticle, does not readily loosen or separate from the metal article and which can be reused a large number of times.

These and other objec'tsof thepresent invention, to-

gether with the advantages thereof over existing prior' art forms which-will become apparent from the following specification are accomplished by the improvements hereinafter described and claimed.

In general, a magneticcorner guard has a housing which contains an end portion and a skirt portion with a magnet attached to at least one ofthe portions.

DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS FIG. lisa side. elevationviewof amagnetic corner guard according to the present invention.

FIG. 2 is a side view of a stacked article having mag netic corner guards of the present invention installed.

FIG. 3 is an end elevation view. of-a cover guard ap-- plied to the corner of an article.

FIG. 4 is a cross sectional view taken on line 4-4 of FIG. 3 showing the corner guard protecting a cover from a corner on an article.

DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS A magnetic corner guard according to the concepts of the present invention is generally indicated by the numeral I0. As shown in FIG. I, corner guard 10 may be a housing having an end portion I2 and a skirt portion 22. Generally, end portion 12 may be of any desirable shape or size so long as it suitably covers entirely or a portion of a protrusion, corner, edge, or the like to which it is to be applied. Although end portion I2 is square as shown in FIG. 3, it may be rectangular, triangular, curvilinear and so forth.

Skirt portion 22 generally has an extent or length which is greater than end portion 12 although said skirt may be the same or even shorter and is generally positioned at approximately 90 or at an obtuse angle with respect to the end portion depending upon the shape of the protrusion. Furthermore, in the preferred embodiment, skirt portion 22 preferably contains two adjacent sides which are set at a 90 angle or at oblique angles with respect to one another and have a smooth transition between the sides. Depending upon the article to bev covered, the angle between adjacent sides 23 of skirt portion 22 may be acute, a 90 angle as shown in the drawings or an obtuse angle. Moreover, skirt portion 22 instead of having two sides as depicted in the preferred embodiment may be curvilinear semi-circular parabolic or the like. The essential factor is that skirt 22 be of a shape such that it traverses an end or sharp surface in the vicinity of an article corner or protrusion. Similarly, although preferably end portion 12 is flat as depicted in the drawings, it may be hemispherical, or otherwise shaped so as to cover a corner or protrusion.

Housing 11 may generally be made of any material so long as it has rounded, curvilinear, or non-abraiding surfaces in'lieu of edges or corners. Desirable materials include wood, and metal. Preferably, housing 11 is made of a durable-plastic such as polyvinylchloride, polyethylene nylon, polycarbonate, polyurethane or the-like. The size of the housing including the skirt and end portions-desirably is of a sufficient thickness so that itcan easily support the weight of a large man if accidentally stepped upon.

Housing 11 generally contains a magnet in end portion 12 and in skirt portion 22. Although only one magnet, preferably in end portion 12, is required, preferably, skirt portion 22 also contains at least one magnet. Magnets 31 may be any conventional magnet such as a bar magnet shown in FIG. 3. In the preferred embodiment, a magnet is riveted to square end portion 12 as in a diagonal relationship. End portion 12 may be concave or more precisely have a flange 13 of such an extent'so that placement of end portion 12 upon the flat surface of an article will permit the magnet to contact the surface. In other words, a very small gap or opening preferably exists between flange 13 and the surface of the article. The magnets on'each side 23 of skirt portion 22 may be recessed as through a flange. Of course,

. end portion 12 as well as skirt portion 22 may contain a plurality of magnets. Generally, the magnet located in end portion 12 may be stronger than magnets located within the skirt portion and either may be attached in any conventional manner.

FIGS. 2 and 4 depict a preferred use of the preferred magnetic corner guard. Layers 35 are'sheets of steel or other magnetic metallic compounds loaded upon the 3 bed 26 of a truck trailer or railroad car. Bands 37 secure and maintain the steel sheets in their stacked condition. In order to protect a cover generally indicated by the numeral 40 which may be made out of any conventional material such as plastic, canvas or the like,

magnetic corner guard is placed upon the exposed corners of the steel to guard the stacked steel layers and the cover such as a tarpaulin may be drawn over the steel and secured to bed 36 in any conventional manner such as through tarpaulin ropes 41 engaging eye hooks 42 mounted on the bed. Since corner guard 10 straddles the corners of a stacked steel layer, and presents no sharp edges or protrusions, cover 40 when moved repeatedly as by the wind, will not abraid, tear or otherwise be damaged.

it should be obvious to one skilled in the art, that corner guard 10 may contain shapes other than the 90 skirt with the skirt being perpendicular to end portion 12. That is, corner guard 10 may have many shapes in order to straddle a protrusion or corner and may be applied to any type of item made of metal such as machines, metal packing crates, metal cargo containers and the like. Moreover, if two corners of article A are relatively close to one another, corner guard 10 may 7 have a second end portion, not shown, so that it may readily be applied to protect a cover from two corners and the common edge of the article.

Accordingly, it is apparent to one skilled in the art that various modifications can be made according to the concept of the present invention without departing from the spirit of the invention herein disclosed. While in accordance with the patent statutes, the preferred embodiment has been illustrated and described in detail, it is to be understood that the invention is not limitd thereto; the scope of the invention being measured by the scope of the attached claims.

What is claimed is:

1. A magnetic corner guard comprising: a housing, said housing having an end portion and a skirt portion, a magnet attached to at least one of said portions, said skirt portion having a greater extent than said end portion, and said skirt having two sides connected at an oblique angle and forming a part of said housing.

2. A magnetic corner guard according to claim 1, wherein at least one magnet is attached to each side.

3. A magnetic corner guard according to claim 2, wherein said end portion has a flange.

4. A magnetic corner guard according to claim 1, wherein said magnet is attached to said end portion.

5. A magnetic corner guard comprising: a housing, said housing having an end portion and a skirt portion, a magnet attached to at least one of said portions, said skirt portion having a greater extent than said end portion, and said skirt having two sides connected at a angle and forming a part of said housing.

6. A magnetic corner guard according to claim 1, wherein said magnet is attached to said end portion.

7. A magnetic corner guard according to claim 6, wherein at least one magnet is attached to each side.

8. A magnetic corner guard according to claim 7, wherein said end portion has a flange. 

1. A magnetic corner guard comprising: a housing, said housing having an end portion and a skirt portion, a magnet attached to at least one of said portions, said skirt portion having a greater extent than said end portion, and said skirt having two sides connected at an oblique angle and forming a part of said housing.
 2. A magnetic corner guard according to claim 1, wherein at least one magnet is attached to each side.
 3. A magnetic corner guard according to claim 2, wherein said end portion has a flange.
 4. A magnetic corner guard according to claim 1, wherein said magnet is attached to said end portion.
 5. A magnetic corner guard comprising: a housing, said housing having an end portion and a skirt portion, a magnet attached to at least one of said portions, said skirt portion having a greater extent than said end portion, and said skirt having two sides connected at a 90* angle and forming a part of said housing.
 6. A magnetic corner guard according to claim 1, wherein said magnet is attached to said end portion.
 7. A magnetic corner guard according to claim 6, wherein at least one magnet is attached to each side.
 8. A magnetic corner guard according to claim 7, wherein said end portion has a flange. 